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Former Apple Exec Speaks Against DRM
Wysz writes "Mike Evangelist, former Director of Product Marketing for Apple's "Pro" applications, has blogged his thoughts about DRM. Like many of us, he is offended by the fact that the record labels and movie studios treat their customers like criminals.
While he notes in the comments section that iTunes is the best of the worst, he admits to using third-party tools to remove the DRM from iTunes tracks."
From his blog:
I agree. This has been my philosophy for a long time. Unfortunately, you can only find out after the fact you've bought something with crap built in. If there is any disclaimer at all on the packaging, it's microscopic (look at the recent Beastie Boys CD). The first thing I do with a new CD is rip it, verify it plays on all of my PC's, and all of my CD and DVD players. If it doesn't, I return it. (And, yes, I even erase the ripped music.)
iTunes is the best of the worst
That's like commending Syphilis for not being AIDS.
Trolling is a art,
...former Apple Exec sued by the RIAA...
If I could, I'd destroy you all.
At least the department store removes the tag after you buy it.
My UID is the product of 2 primes.
The fight against DRM cannot be won. Visions of a future where media companies and other copyright holders kowtow to consumer demand and release all of their content in an unprotected format to be infinitely copied are ludicrous. The only reason this occurs now is due to the consumer technology gap. If I buy a Britney Spears CD, it has to work in the CD player I bought in 1990. Companies can't implement any real DRM without breaking backwards compatibility.
Expect this to change, soon. Your content will be encrypted at the source and will only be decrypted by the hardware, at the last possible phase, using your personal key and with proper authorization from the license server. As long as we put copyright law on the books, technology will be developed to allow it to be enforced. Live with it.
domain combinatorics
he is offended by the fact that the fact that the record labels...
Did anybody else notice the disturbance in the Matrix?
Bradley Holt
What I really dislike about DRM is the general consensus that everything actually will have DRM in the future. Even many hardcore geeks at Slashdot seem to reason DRM is here to stay and, if anything, we should try to use the lesser of all the evils. Well, I don't agree (and I didn't vote for Bush either, *shrug*) and the sooner the consumers unite somehow and nicely tell the record- and movie industry we don't want their freaking DRM the better.
Microsoft, being a maker of software based DRM-solutions, plays along nicely by reinforcing the record/movie industry's "threat" that they are "forced" to use DRM if future content should be playable at all in the future. This is _untrue!_ Even if many content industries want DRM, it's not needed, and we shouldn't give up and let them have it that way. Think about it, if a CD can be played in a stereo, even if the stereo has some kind of DRM, any competent taiwanese manufacutrer should be able to create a player for the computer, regardless if RIAA, MPAA or Microsoft likes that or not. That's the way it should be.
I am worried someday, somewhere, some freaking moron political figures will rule the computer is an "entertainment device" and must be managed with DRM (think Vista, Trusted Computing etc). That's the day we are all fucked, even if don't actually listen to music or watch TV.
Come on. Are we really supposed to believe that they had a Director of Product Marketing named Mike Evangelist? And I suppose they've got an engineer named Dave Engineer too. And users named Joe Sixpack. And an HR guy named Steve Jobs.
Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.
Yeah, but when you pay for a shirt at the store, they take that protection off before you take it home. DRM big music style on your shirt would be like saying you can only wash it in our coin machines, and you can't pass it down to your kid brother years on down the road. Nor could you legally rip out the collar tags that keep sticking up, adding unnecessarily to your geek factor. It's one thing to prevent theft, it's another to treat consumers like slime.
-Buddy of DoQ
not if you steal it.
Having trouble with your reading comprehension?
Does the name George Orwell mean anything to you people. Wake up and smell the coffee! Big Brother is coming, and we need to stop it now before its too late. I'm serious...stop laughing dammit...ok now I'm ticked! Seriously though, we as Americans and citizens of other Free Nations need to stand up and say that "we will not allow corporations to take away our rights and freedom no matter what". Send a clear message to the RIAA, boycott their products, and spread the word that you can boycotting them and why. All that's needed to start a landslide is a single pebble. Are YOU that pebble? Think about it.
Michael "TheZorch" Haney
thezorch@gmail.com
http://thezorch.googlepages.com/home
> He's basically fed up with format change, and he's ticked off that there are things he
> thinks he ought to be able to do with the new format (copy it freely to every digital
> device) that he can't do.
No, it isn't the format change. We all know that is unavoidable. This is different. This is THEM assuming total control. In the past, all media was essentially free. You could loan it to a friend, make a working copy (dump an LP to tape for the road, etc) make mix tapes, etc. You couldn't make and sell copies, not because of a technoligical restriction but simply because, well it is illegal. Not anymore. They want the right to dictate where and how you will play it, how long you can play it and eventually will insist on the right to charge you by the play. Unless we say NO, right now.
Democrat delenda est
In a retail store that enables tags like the GP mentioned? Yup.
Employee Theft 48.5% $15.1 billion
Shoplifting 31.7% $9.7 billion
Administrative Error 15.3% $4.8 billion
Vendor Fraud 5.4% $1.7 billion
From another source:Or another I have never heard of any data to the contrary, but _everybody_ might not know that as you implied.
If you don't like DRM, suggest another way for them to sell music. (And no bullshit answers about giving it away and making their money off concerts and t-shirt sales. Suggest a solution which doesn't involve simply giving up all that sales revenue.) If you can't come up with anything better than what's out there now, why would you be surprised that they can't either, and are desperately experimenting with so many bad ideas?
This seems a little over-the-top to me. Consider this example. Ford has just "invented" the assembly line. It's now possible to build cars extremely cheaply. In other words, the cost or reproduction has gone down by an order of magnitude. Let's say there had been car-makers before that, but they made custom cars to order, one at a time. They would see this sudden new method of production as a threat, and try to artificially maintain inflated prices. Would they be justified in shutting Ford down?
I'm well aware this analogy doesn't really work, but there are elements of it that are important. Firstly, the real change here is in production. Music distributors DO NOT MAKE MUSIC. That's what bands do. So when you buy a CD from a Warner or whatever, you're not paying Warner for the music, you're paying Warner for the CD. Of course, you're also paying Warner to market the CD, you're paying them to possible promote the band. And part of your money is actually going to fund the band itself.
So essentially the music industry has become a big middle man. They don't make music, they promote and distribute it. But now they are no longer needed for distribution. The method of production has gotten cheaper and anyone with a PC can do it. They arguably don't need to promote it either - with the internet it's possible to disseminate information for free - or almost.
So before you, or anyone gets all high and mighty about "they make a living selling music, blah blah blah" you have to ask yourself - are they really needed any more? And if not, then why should we keep them around? We don't keep blacksmiths around either. Of course the industy has a vested interest in keeping itself alive, but that doesn't mean we have to roll over and let them extort money from us when they no longer really have much to offer us.
So what should replace this business model? Clearly bands need to get paid or we won't have full-time artists anymore. So money needs to change hands. That is clear. I'd recommend dropping the price on physical CDs considerably - like $5 bucks a pop. If the good is sufficiently elastic you'll make the m oney back in increased revenue. Shift to an online model. There are plenty of sites that want to sell music cheap. Reduce the price for an mp3 to 10 cents or something. Share the profits more equitably between distributor and band. There you go. Let fan sites handle promoting.
That may or may not be the perfect solution, but here's the key point. It's not the consumer's job to come up with a new business model. And if the currrent business model has become irrelevant, we don't have an obligation to develop a new one before pointing out that the current one is irrelevant.
Let's be realistic. Change is inevitable. The industry can fight it, and be crushed eventually, or they can downsize and reinvent themselves. Painful, yes, but nothing like the alternative.
stormin
The Southern Baptist Convention has creationism. On Slashdot, we have porn.
There. Fixed that for you. ;-)
Modern copyright is theft of culture from everyone and it retards the progress of the useful arts and sciences.
If you don't like DRM, suggest another way for them to sell music.
Ok, here's one: sell music without DRM. CDs, mp3s, DVDs, whatever floats your boat.
CD burners have been available for nearly a decade now. Mass copying of digital music has been feasible, and known to your average Joe, for years now. Broadband is pretty standard in most countries. Yet people still buy CDs by the millions.
Why?
Because the vast majority of people are honest. They'd LIKE to pay for things. I know it's easy to assume everyone is out to steal from everyone else, but the numbers simply don't reflect this. Mass copying of free digital music has been available and easy to use for years now, and yet people still buy CDs by the truckload.
You're always going to lose some sales due to piracy, sure. Maybe even a decent percentage (10-20%). But overall, most people are quite willing to give up some money for a quality product. Don't believe me? Here in Canada, copying CDs for personal use is 100% legal. Most interpretations of the law say that sharing/downloading mp3s is also 100% legal. Yet CDs still sell, and sell well. Record stores aren't going out of business in droves, people still have a collection of CDs in their cars, and the music industry is still making a profit.
Should copying be illegal? Maybe. That'll stop the casual users. DRM will never stop the dedicated. They're just not interested in buying your music. Short of not releasing it, you'll never stop these people. But the masses will happily pay for unencumbered mp3s.
It's kind of like bottled water. Water is free, right? Then why is bottled water a multi-million dollar industry?
Convenience. Imagine a music store with everything, and no DRM. I'd be paying thousands every year for music at the rate I chew through it, even though I could easily get it for free. DRM doesn't stop music from getting onto P2P networks, and it never will. All it does is stop me from buying music from iTunes, etc.
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
"You don't buy the music you buy permission to experience it."
No. I bought the music, the media it was recorded on, and the right to copy and remix it any way I like. What I don't have is the right to copy and redistribute without permission from the *copyright* owner, which is NOT the same as the owner of the music. Music is not property, and it cannot be owned any more than an idea can be owned. The idea of illegal redistribution was envisioned to be illegal CD manufactories and suchlike, NOT Joe Suburban copying records onto tape.
I have fair use rights to copy the music for personal use, which by common law for over thirty years meant, among other rights, the right to make copies and share it with friends. Music companies have tried to outlaw this, but legislatures and courts had skillfully ducked around finding such copying "unlawful". Up until recently, the infraction was a civil one, not criminal, which meant the infringer was liable for civil damages limited to actual monetary damages caused to the copyright holder -- less than a few bucks per album copied. Record companies didn't bother suing people for dozens of dollars, so massive copists like Metallica's band members, who copied thousands of other people's albums from vinyl to tape when they were young and poor, got away clean.
Now, with skillful placement of bribes to congressmen and a 30+ campaign to put Federalist Society judges on the bench, it's criminal to copy music, and the "damages" per individual copist is judged in the hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars -- obvious horseshit.
I don't mean to drown out your other points, as they are worthy. But we can't let them own this "license to experience on the correct media" meme. To win a semantic war, you can't let the enemy redefine the terms of the argument.
At least the department store removes the tag after you buy it.
Lets take this a little bit further.
A department store decides to leaves the anti-theft tag on it's clothes permanently to prevent people from copying it's designs. You go to the store and buy a baseball cap. You take the cap home and your wife thinks it's cool too, but the tag jumps in the way and refused to let her put it on her head. Your daughter finds a hack to let her wear the cap, but the damn thing is watermarked so the store can tell it's "stolen". The store sees her wearing the cap and sues you.
You deal with the lawsuit and throw away the hacked cap, but you liked the cap so much you buy a second copy. You wear it regularly for a while then put it in a drawer and only wear it occasionally. When you decide to buy a new house and move, the cap refuses to let the movers take it out of the old house. It also refuses to let the new owners of the old house use it. It sits in the garage and is useless to anyone.
You still are pretty charmed by the cap so you buy a third copy. Since you've been going bald for a few years, it's nice to have your head covered up on summer days. After watching infomercials late at night, you decide the Hair Club for Men is the thing for you. You're really happy with your new "hair" but you still want some cover so you go to put on the cap. It refuses to go on your head.
You are PISSED! You've bought three copies of that F**KING cap and now you can't even use it, just cause you have new "hair". You swear to never buy another cap from that GOD D**NED company. But the cap really has a lot of sentimental value so you end up buying a fourth copy anyway.
Yep, DRM is just like those little tags
TW